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Thread: Thoughts on MBK Program

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    Senior Member StarkVegasSteve's Avatar
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    Thoughts on MBK Program

    After settling down from last night I was finally able to get some thoughts on in my opinion what is currently going on with the program under Howland

    1. As mad as we are, it's MILES better than it was in the mid 2010's. I know that I sometimes lose sight of this but where we are now and where we were under Rick Ray is a MASSIVE gap. That we can absolutely be thankful for.

    2. We're not an elite blueblood program. We need to understand this. We're not on the level of Kentucky, Duke, UNC, Gonzaga, Arizona, etc. and we're probably not in that next level of Wisconsin, Michigan, Oregon, Florida St., Arkansas, or LSU. We're in whatever that 3rd tier is. Not saying that's a bad tier. I think we're in there with Alabama and Auburn. We sometimes, myself included, think we're historically better than we actually are. Now that doesn't mean that we shouldn't still want to compete for championships, but we need to have a realistic view of what success looks like.

    3. Howland should get one more year with this team . I think this team has a lot of potential and I think Ben deserves to be the one to see it through. However, he needs to understand that it's Tourney or Bust next year. We will have far too much returning talent to not be a Top 25 team.

    4. Ben, PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS HOLY LEARN HOW TO ATTACK A 17 ZONE. We look like a freaking Jr. High team trying to attack a zone. It's ridiculous and maddening. We probably need to have Tolu in the mid post instead of Adu. But that's just my opinion. I mean this is year 6 and we still can't figure out a zone.

    5. We need to start recruiting 3 and D guys. We need spot up shooters if we're ever going to take the next step. A Reginald Delk or a Riley Benock would benefit this team greatly.

    6. We might need to look at putting Deivon at 1 and moving Molinar off the ball. I don't really see the benefit of Jalen Johnson starting, especially if he's not hitting shots. And I think Molinar would benefit going back off the ball again. I think it would take some pressure off him.

    In closing, the next two weeks are going to be rough and I imagine that Saturday is going to be BAD. But hey, only one month til baseball.

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    Senior Member msstate7's Avatar
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    I wanna see d. Smith start soon. I like Johnson but he seems to have to a hard time getting open or us finding him one.

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    I just do not understand how a team can be so Jekyll and Hyde, so good one game and so terrible the next. It seems to me that pride in ones self not to mention the team ought to level the highs and lows so we can be a more consistent team. This is maddening as other posters have said.

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    Senior Member Commercecomet24's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Extendedcab View Post
    I just do not understand how a team can be so Jekyll and Hyde, so good one game and so terrible the next. It seems to me that pride in ones self not to mention the team ought to level the highs and lows so we can be a more consistent team. This is maddening as other posters have said.
    Yeah from Saturday to last night looked like 2 completely different teams, but that's been the story of Howlands tenure, no consistency.

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    Senior Member StarkVegasSteve's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Commercecomet24 View Post
    Yeah from Saturday to last night looked like 2 completely different teams, but that's been the story of Howlands tenure, no consistency.
    We really didn't play all that well Saturday once they jumped in the zone. I just don't understand our inability to attack it. I can guarantee you that's most of what we'll see on Saturday.

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    Senior Member Todd4State's Avatar
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    This is sad but my main reasoning for keeping Howland another year is we are young and I don't trust Cohen with the next hire.

    I'd rather keep Howland with his faults and try to develop Molinar, Smith, Stewart, and Javian rather than hire a coach that is their friend who does something that doesn't fit their skill set.

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    Senior Member msstate7's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Todd4State View Post
    This is sad but my main reasoning for keeping Howland another year is we are young and I don't trust Cohen with the next hire.

    I'd rather keep Howland with his faults and try to develop Molinar, Smith, Stewart, and Javian rather than hire a coach that is their friend who does something that doesn't fit their skill set.
    Johnson said it best on sps... stick with howland keeping us respectable for a few more years, and he'll most likely retire. Hiring his replacement would be much easier in that situation.

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    Senior Member BrunswickDawg's Avatar
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    Since the Williams era, we typically built toward having a team of JR/SRs that had come in as a group, work together, and had 2 solid seasons (meaning making the NCAAs). We would then drop off to NITish level for a couple of years while the next core group developed. The exception to that is '02-'05 when we got damn lucky with Lawrence Roberts and Shane Power transferred in and picked up where Bowers and Zimmerman left off giving us 4 years in a row of great ball.

    There is a reason we were picked 12th in the SEC this year - and we are seeing it on the floor. We are young and inexperienced - but have a core that is talented enough that they could exceed expectations.

    And keep this in mind - after year 6, Richard Williams was 85-87 with an SEC title and a 1 and done NCAA; Ben Howland is 107-73 a 1 and done NCAA appearance (would have been 2 sans COVID). And yes, I equate the state of the program where each of them took over as being pretty much equal. But, Howland has us back to where we were under Williams or Stansbury. We were patient with those 2 coaches, why not let Howland take this group through the next 3 years?
    Last edited by BrunswickDawg; 01-20-2021 at 01:35 PM.
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    Senior Member StarkVegasSteve's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg View Post
    Since the Williams era, we typically built toward having a team of JR/SRs that had come in as a group, work together, and had 2 solid seasons (meaning making the NCAAs). We would then drop off to NITish level for a couple of years while the next core group developed. The exception to that is '02-'05 when we got damn lucky with Lawrence Roberts and Shane Power transferred in and picked up where Bowers and Zimmerman left off giving us 4 years in a row of great ball.

    There is a reason we were picked 12th in the SEC this year - and we are seeing it on the floor. We are young and inexperienced - but have a core that is talented enough that they could exceed expectations.

    And keep this in mind - after year 6, Richard Williams was 85-87 with an SEC title and a 1 and done NCAA; Ben Howland is 107-73 a 1 and done NCAA appearance (would have been 2 sans COVID). And yes, I equate the state of the program where each of them took over as being pretty much equal. But, Howland has us back to where we were under Williams or Stansbury. We were patient with those 2 coaches, why not let Howland take this group through the next 3 years?
    Because like I mentioned, some in the fan base have an inflated expectation of what our program is.

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    Quote Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg View Post
    Since the Williams era, we typically built toward having a team of JR/SRs that had come in as a group, work together, and had 2 solid seasons (meaning making the NCAAs). We would then drop off to NITish level for a couple of years while the next core group developed. The exception to that is '02-'05 when we got damn lucky with Lawrence Roberts and Shane Power transferred in and picked up where Bowers and Zimmerman left off giving us 4 years in a row of great ball.

    There is a reason we were picked 12th in the SEC this year - and we are seeing it on the floor. We are young and inexperienced - but have a core that is talented enough that they could exceed expectations.

    And keep this in mind - after year 6, Richard Williams was 85-87 with an SEC title and a 1 and done NCAA; Ben Howland is 107-73 a 1 and done NCAA appearance (would have been 2 sans COVID). And yes, I equate the state of the program where each of them took over as being pretty much equal. But, Howland has us back to where we were under Williams or Stansbury. We were patient with those 2 coaches, why not let Howland take this group through the next 3 years?
    I agree with most of this, especially because I think it would be difficult to find a solid coach to come here after firing Howland based on bringing us back from nothing, but we weren?t making the NCAA tournament last year. We would?ve had to win the SEC tournament and that was a small chance considering how Auburn turned it on at the end

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    Senior Member Cooterpoot's Avatar
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    Do we want to commit to winning in basketball? The answer is, unfortunately, no. We'll continue losing to OM and playing in the NIT.

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    Senior Member Todd4State's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by msstate7 View Post
    Johnson said it best on sps... stick with howland keeping us respectable for a few more years, and he'll most likely retire. Hiring his replacement would be much easier in that situation.
    I totally agree with that. And given the make up of the roster I wouldn't be surprised if this group is his last hurrah. Given what we know about Cohen and his hires at this point I'm more willing to stay with Howland and his known faults in the hopes that we are good the next two years with a veteran team rather than blow everything up and completely rebuild with some coach that does something fancy and has to run everyone off to get his players in to make his whatever the complete opposite of Howland system is work.

    Basically I'm gambling on 2-3 potentially solid seasons rather than have to endure an almost guaranteed really long rebuild given Cohen's track record.

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    Senior Member Todd4State's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cooterpoot View Post
    Do we want to commit to winning in basketball? The answer is, unfortunately, no. We'll continue losing to OM and playing in the NIT.
    Does being an Adidas school hurt us too? I mean- Jordan is with Nike.

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    Regarding the zone ... first football and the rush 3 drop 8; now basketball with the 3-2 Zone. Certainly hope the 5-3 zone defense in baseball doesn't give the diamong dawgs fits.

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    Senior Member StarkVegasSteve's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Todd4State View Post
    I totally agree with that. And given the make up of the roster I wouldn't be surprised if this group is his last hurrah. Given what we know about Cohen and his hires at this point I'm more willing to stay with Howland and his known faults in the hopes that we are good the next two years with a veteran team rather than blow everything up and completely rebuild with some coach that does something fancy and has to run everyone off to get his players in to make his whatever the complete opposite of Howland system is work.

    Basically I'm gambling on 2-3 potentially solid seasons rather than have to endure an almost guaranteed really long rebuild given Cohen's track record.
    If we were to cut bait with Howland we'd be looking at a minimum of a 3 year rebuild with a GREAT hire. And Cohen hasn't shown the ability to make that outside of baseball. Now some would bring up that Nate Oats has Bama rolling in Year 2 but there's no similarities to the two situations. Avery Johnson already had most of these guys recruited and Oats has just given them free reign to shoot it. We don't have the horses to be able to run something like that if we were to bring in say, Dan D'Antoni or Darian DeVries.

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    Quote Originally Posted by StarkVegasSteve View Post
    After settling down from last night I was finally able to get some thoughts on in my opinion what is currently going on with the program under Howland

    1. As mad as we are, it's MILES better than it was in the mid 2010's. I know that I sometimes lose sight of this but where we are now and where we were under Rick Ray is a MASSIVE gap. That we can absolutely be thankful for.

    2. We're not an elite blueblood program. We need to understand this. We're not on the level of Kentucky, Duke, UNC, Gonzaga, Arizona, etc. and we're probably not in that next level of Wisconsin, Michigan, Oregon, Florida St., Arkansas, or LSU. We're in whatever that 3rd tier is. Not saying that's a bad tier. I think we're in there with Alabama and Auburn. We sometimes, myself included, think we're historically better than we actually are. Now that doesn't mean that we shouldn't still want to compete for championships, but we need to have a realistic view of what success looks like.

    3. Howland should get one more year with this team . I think this team has a lot of potential and I think Ben deserves to be the one to see it through. However, he needs to understand that it's Tourney or Bust next year. We will have far too much returning talent to not be a Top 25 team.

    4. Ben, PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS HOLY LEARN HOW TO ATTACK A 17 ZONE. We look like a freaking Jr. High team trying to attack a zone. It's ridiculous and maddening. We probably need to have Tolu in the mid post instead of Adu. But that's just my opinion. I mean this is year 6 and we still can't figure out a zone.

    5. We need to start recruiting 3 and D guys. We need spot up shooters if we're ever going to take the next step. A Reginald Delk or a Riley Benock would benefit this team greatly.

    6. We might need to look at putting Deivon at 1 and moving Molinar off the ball. I don't really see the benefit of Jalen Johnson starting, especially if he's not hitting shots. And I think Molinar would benefit going back off the ball again. I think it would take some pressure off him.

    In closing, the next two weeks are going to be rough and I imagine that Saturday is going to be BAD. But hey, only one month til baseball.
    I think a lot of our fans would be okay with being "3rd tier" if we were fun to watch. We rarely are. That's why the program has lost so many fans, not the record.

  17. #17
    Senior Member StarkVegasSteve's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by ArrowDawg View Post
    I think a lot of our fans would be okay with being "3rd tier" if we were fun to watch. We rarely are. That's why the program has lost so many fans, not the record.
    Ok so I'll pose this question to you because I do actually agree with your point. But would you rather be a fun team and lose 91-87 or have not so pretty of a team but win 58-54.

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    I think the question is rhetorical because if we're winning, the bitching would be a lot less on this board.

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    Senior Member msstate7's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Extendedcab View Post
    I think the question is rhetorical because if we're winning, the bitching would be a lot less on this board.
    We are winning. We're 6th in the sec in conference wins the last 3+ seasons. That's not bad. We were tied for 5th yesterday with Florida, but they passed us last night

  20. #20
    Senior Member Cooterpoot's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by msstate7 View Post
    We are winning. We're 6th in the sec in conference wins the last 3+ seasons. That's not bad. We were tied for 5th yesterday with Florida, but they passed us last night
    I think we can be better. But we won't try.

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